


Soft Edges

by Hare_Brained_Scheme



Category: DuckTales (Cartoon 2017)
Genre: Fethry joins F.O.W.L. AU, Implied Child Abuse, M/M, Minor Violence, Steelbeak backstory
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-21
Updated: 2021-02-22
Packaged: 2021-03-18 04:28:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,781
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29603859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hare_Brained_Scheme/pseuds/Hare_Brained_Scheme
Summary: Steelbeak wasn't stupid.He knew how groups like F.O.W.L. worked. No misunderstandings of loyalty or friendship. You were either useful or you were dead.He was brutal, ruthless. He wasn't about to lower his guard.And then he met Fethry Duck.
Relationships: Fethry Duck/Steelbeak
Comments: 9
Kudos: 24





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Fethry in F.O.W.L. AU created by @zara2148 
> 
> Lezbianhest, if you're in this tag, you already know about Mighty_Ant's Man From F.O.W.L, if not GO AND READ IT NOW, I would not have made it this far without their influence, which I'm sure you'll pick up on in this fic.
> 
> I'm 1 million years late to the party, everyone is already helping put away the folding chairs but here I am.

“That-” Hammerhead exclaimed while delivering a solid, jovial, slap across Steelbeak’s back, “was beautiful!”

Above, starlight gleamed through the smog-filled night sky, providing little light as Steelbeak and Hammerhead made their way through the dark, lampless, city streets. The air was cool and crisp against Steelbeak’s face, keeping his senses sharp, that or the adrenaline high he was still coming down from. 

In the distance, the horn of a freight train blared. A dog barked behind a chain link fence. Police sirens-or maybe it was an ambulance- whined before disappearing into the night.

Good ol’ St. Canard. It was just as he remembered.

He hadn’t ventured to this part of the city since he started working under F.O.W.L.’s dollar. Part of their sales pitch was that they’d send him all over the world. That part had been true enough. Though, he guessed it was some kind of poetic justice that he’d end up back in the same seedy streets he had grown up on, back when he was just another street urchin. Only this time, he was walking over them in italian leather oxfords rather than a pair of dirty torn sneakers he snagged off a telephone wire. 

The goat to his right, strutting an equally impressive pair of shoes, continued to slap Steelbeak’s back as they walked. Juxtaposed to the merry mood of his companion, Steelbeak felt himself grimace at the touch. He’d much rather trade fists than business cards with this goon but his mission, as Director Buzzard had clearly laid out, was to play nice. 

Yesterday had been the weekly briefing meeting. All of F.O.W.L.’s agents, gathered around a long conference table as Director Buzzard droned on about mission status updates, assignments, and whichever phase of his million-step program to steal the world from under McDuck’s bill they were entering. Director Buzzard, Steelbeak had realized, was quite fond of slideshow presentations and the dull droning voice paired with the irregular clicking of the slideshow’s remote faded into white noise. Steelbeak could usually listen with half a mind while his mind wandered to other things.

If Heron’s bionic arm had a toothbrush function, did that mean it came with toothpaste too? Not much use having an emergency toothbrush on hand if you didn’t have the toothpaste to go with it. But did that mean she made her own toothpaste inside the arm? Or did Heron have to restock the supply with toothpaste cartridges?

He was trying to imagine Heron pulling off her arm and unscrewing a panel to fill a trapdoor with toothpaste when the buzzard barked his name, pulling his attention back to the speaker and the screen behind him.

“Steelbeak, you have a new assignment.” The image on the projector screen flicked to a mean looking goat. 

“This is Hammerhead Hannigan, henchman to the notorious Taurus Bulba.”

“The crime boss?”

Bradford’s glare fell on Steelbeak at the interruption, but he answered all the same. 

“Yes. As a former St. Canard resident, and… participant in some of the underground circuits, I assumed you would have some familiarity with the organized crime world of St. Canard.”

“So what’s the job, you want me to take out horns over there?”

“Just the opposite. Taurus Bulba single handedly constructed an entire crime empire within the underbelly of St. Canard while upholding the public image as the head of a prestigious lab. He maintains certain...resources we may benefit access from. But the man himself is cautious and selective in who he conducts his business dealings with. He rarely meets face to face with potential new partners, sending his underlings in his place. You are to meet with Hammerhead and describe the benefits and services F.O.W.L can offer Bulba. This will be the first of a long line of negotiations that, hopefully, will lead to a mutually beneficial partnership. 

“Your job is to meet with his henchman, negotiate over cigars and a game of pool or whatever you St. Canadians enjoy, and establish a good-faith relationship. “

Bradford Buzzard paused to turn up the degrees on his already scathing glare. “That should be simple enough that even you can manage. If you don’t mess up this most basic task then maybe we’ll consider giving you greater responsibilities in future missions. Is that understood?”

Yeah, I can do that,” Steelbeak answered crossing his arms over his chest. Something still wasn’t sitting right.

“But why give this assignment over to me? And why send me in solo instead of partnered with Black Heron? You haven’t trusted me with anything more than babysitting duty since the lighthouse fiasco.”

“I’m staying off of this mission,” Heron answered for the buzzard from her seat across from the conference table. “Taurus Bulba and I had a run in back in the 90’s. For the best interest of the mission, it’s best if my involvement is minute.”

“What did you do, offend him with your disco-era get up? Or had you still not realized the poodle skirt had gone out of style? Steelbeak expected Heron to lash out at that last remark, but it would have been worth it to get a jab in at her. 

Fury crossed over Black Heron’s features, she opened her beak to respond but instead Bradford cut her off.

“Taurus Bulba is aware of Black Heron’s experimentation in human cybernetic enhancements. He is, shall we say, less than enthusiastic on the subject.” 

“Why a murderous crime lord would pretend to have a moral compass when it comes to using man as experimental test subjects is beyond me.” Black Heron remarked, seemingly iffed that the biggest name in organized crime would find her work immoral. 

Steelbeak wasn’t entirely sure what that meant or why Heron would be bothered, but he decided to tuck that information away for later. Maybe he could bring it up later in a taunt the next time she insulted him. 

“Enough Black Heron! ” Bradford snapped, “Steelbeak,” he said, redirecting his glare towards him, “this is the most important partnership we’ve ever attempted. Do. Not. Mess. This. Up.” He spoke the last few words slowly as if taking extra care to make sure Steelbeak understood each and every one. Stelebeak felt heat rise under his collar. 

“Do you understand?”

“In-dude-hillbilly.” 

Bradford blinked.

“He means indubitably,” Heron muttered from across the table, fingers rubbing a circular motion over her eyelids.

Hammerhead continued to shower praises on Steelbeak as the two stole away from the bridge, back to the clubhouse where their night had begun. 

“Brutal! Just brutal! The way you decked that guy-” Hammerhead mimed a punching motion as he spoke - “Pow! Right in the kisser!” 

The night had started out tame enough. Steelbeak and Hammerhead met up at the designated clubhouse, far on the outskirts of the City near the docks, where underhand businesses dealings and shifty characters thrived. 

They eyed each other up and down with equal wariness and suspicion, weighing their chances if the negotiations went south. Steelbeak was pretty sure he could take this guy in a fight, even with the horns. But there were plenty of places a weapon could be hiding in Hammerhead’s oversized suit jacket.

But each of them had been sent by their bosses to play nice and they both knew it. So glass of scotch in one hand, pool cue in the other, they began their conversation on their respective organizations, slipping in their intimidation games by swapping stories of jobs they’d done. A little torture here, a little assassination of local politicans there, extortion of a wealthy CEOs on the weekends. They found ways to get their point across. 

Hammerhead had bragged about the kidnapping and mild battery of the child of an olympic coach, to guarantee a set match.

He had to feign a tight-beaked smile at that one. Steelbeak didn’t hit kids. He would kidnap them, steal from them, shove them out of his way, toss them across a room, participate in a series of fiendish events that may or may not directly or indirectly lead to their deaths, but he would not lay a closed fist on a kid. 

Steelbeak had been recounting the broken fingers he had given a politician that had the indecency not to be crooked when he first noticed the eavesdropper. He may not be sciency smart like Black Heron but he could tell when a seemingly unassuming patron sitting at a lone table was invested in an outside conversation. 

“I think I saw some teeth come out with that one!” Hammerhead chortled. Now, he was nothing but praises and smiles, slapping his back as they strolled the city streets, like they were best chums. 

The man in a trench coat (cliche much) had asked for an entire bowl of peanuts yet never touched the snack. When Steelbeak or Hammerhead moved to the far side of the pool table while talking, the man’s neck, turned ever so slightly to follow their conversation. When Steelbeak suggested they move back to the bar to refill their drinks, the man chose that as the time to walk up to the bar counter to refill his untouched bowl of nuts. 

Steelbeak may not have finished elementary school but his years of running in a juvenile street gang with kids who would mug an old lady with you in the morning, then steal the shoes off your feet while you slept- followed by a career of looking over his shoulder while in underground fighting ring, never knowing when you’d get suckerpunched outside of a fight- plus the time he spent in prison, half expecting a shiv in the abdomen whenever he turned a corner- had heightened his sensitivity to these kinds of things. 

Call it paranoia but it had kept him alive. 

“And the way you dangled him over the edge of the bridge till he squealed-”

After starting a fist fight that pushed both Steelbeak and the strange man out of the bar, he edged him towards the water, until delivering the final blow that brought the man to his knees. From there, Steelbeak held the man over the edge of the bridge, what would be a 200-foot drop- until he confessed he was an agent of SHUSH assigned to tail them.

“-Classic villainy! It was like watching an artist at work!”

Before he could get out any more of the guy, some purple weirdo showed up in a puff a smoke.The Terrible Flop Knight- or whatever he called himself- Steelbeak hadn’t really given the masked man a chance to finish his monologue. St. Canard was known for its eccentric villainy and when some purple weirdo in a cape and a mask cuts into your interrogation, you don’t assume he’s there for comic con. 

“And the way you dropped the poor sap! You, my friend, are ruthless!”

Steelbeak hadn’t known if the Terrible Flop Knight would make the dive to save the SHUSH agent’s life. He was interfering with his interrogation so he was either on the SHUSH agent’s side, or another eccentric villain there to show Steelbeak up. It was a 50/50 shot but the masked weirdo dove for the agent as soon as he began to fall and Steelbeak and Hammerhead used the distraction to get away.

“Listen, guy, I like your style, and my boss, I know he’d like you too. You’ve got the goods kid! You’ve got that stone-cold, old-fashioned kind of villainy. An original! A real original kid!! Imma tell my boss what happened here tonight. I think you and uh, FOWL was it? We’ll be getting in touch again.” 

The goat laughed out loud and shook Steelbeak by the shoulder as they walked, like they were lifelong drinking buddies.

Steelbeak really didn’t like this guy. He carried himself with the confidence of a goon who had gotten to where he was today by brutalizing everyone in his path, but would cower with his tail between his legs the second the boss was unhappy. He was more lapdog than henchman, a rabid, killer lapdog, that never once made a decision for himself. 

“I think you could be a valuable friend,” he said the words through a smile like an oil slick on the bay, slippery and gleaming with something sinister. He knew that smile. It was the same smile Black Heron had given him when she found him in his tiny dank prison cell.

“Well, well, well” she said, eyes glinting in the dimly lit room, smile tugging across her sharp, potentially lethal beak, “what do we have here?”

He slapped Steelbeak on the back again before they parted ways, “Ruthless! Absolutely ruthless,” Hammerhead laughed to himself as he went. 

Steelbeak was left alone in the darkness of the City with only the moon reflecting off the bay and far off city lights to guide him through the cracked and darkened streets. It was quieter now, he could hear the silver waves lapping against the docks. 

He had done it. He had done the job and he had done it well, just like he always knew he would. He met with Bulba’s henchmen, impressed the goon, established the beginning of a “good faith relationship” or whatever the Buzzard had called it. Bulba’s guy had called him an original. He was finally, finally getting the recognition he deserved. If Director Buzzard was to be believed, this meant bigger responsibilities. No more chump work. No more being locked up on base as a glorified babysitter. 

So why did he feel so hollow?

He should be basking in the appraisal, accepting each and every compliment, and singing his own praises wherever Hammerhead had left them out. 

But instead, he walked the empty city streets, grim faced. He tried to imagine what would come next. Tomorrow morning he’d give Director Buzzards a briefing of what had happened tonight, tell him of his success, and the alliance. Even the sour faced buzzard who seemed to have a frown permanently pressed into his face should be pleased to hear that shouldn’t he? He’d be forced to recognize Steelbeak’s ability, offer him new, bigger, better responsibilities in their plot to steal the world. No more babysitting assets.

But even as he tried to fantasize what that might look like, he found his thoughts kept slipping back to the smile of a particular duck. 

His cheeks burned at the thought. He shook his head, as if he could physically banish the thought with the motion. It was dumb. Super dumb. Who cares about the smile of the McDuck nephew? Certainly not him.

But even as he told himself this, the image materialized in his mind, Fethry’s smile, soft and warm like the sun rising over the icy bay. 

The worst part was that he knew Fethery would be happy for him. He could picture Fethry’s reaction as clear as day. Knew how his eyes would light up, how he would beam at him. “A promotion? That’s great Steelbeak!”

But what would happen after, when he asked what he had done to earn the promotion? What kind of look of horror would cross over his face when Steelbeak told him he had thrown a man off a bridge after beating him to a bloody pulp. What would happen after he confessed, oh by the way Fethry, that the super top secret organization that had hired you as marine biologist? It's actually the Fiendish Organization for World Larceny that’s been plotting against your uncle and only hired you to hold you as a hostage. But still, I think I’m getting promoted, pretty great right?

Steelbeak shook his head again. He only then noticed the splatters of blood dotted across his knuckles. He scowled. Probably not his. He had done pretty well in the fight with the SHUSH agent. He rubbed a thumb over a knuckle but the blood had already dried into his feathers and didn’t so much as smudge. 

He grumbled to himself and shoved his hands into his pockets and tried not to think of Fethry or his smile for the rest of the walk home.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More Steelbeak backstory this time around.
> 
> Same warning tags as in the previous chapter, but the violence and implied child abuse is a bit more detailed this time around.

He learned how to take a blow before he learned how to deal one.

In a house with fragile and brittle air, that could be shattered at any moment- by one wrong move, one wrong word,-he learned to watch the movement in a shoulder, to predict where the blow would land, learned when to steady himself in preparation and when to go limp, learned how to tell by feel and pacing when the hits were coming to their end or when they were going to start up again.

Curled up in his best hiding spot, beak clamped shut, fists balled tight, he spent hours staring at the peeling wallpaper decorated with flowers bending to a non-existent wind. In that small and dusty space between the wall and couch, he’d squeeze his eyes shut, trying to force back the hot burning tears, choking on the dust coating the floorboards, swallowing his own shaky breath because he couldn’t let himself cry out or else he’d be found and his best hiding space would be ruined. He'd pull his knees to his chest resembling a small, trembling ball, pressed into himself, trying to make himself disappear entirely.

_“What are you, stupid???”_

The shout that shattered the walls.

He had spilled a purple drink, adding the newest stain to the already splotched carpet.

_“What are you, stupid???”_

They ran out of laundry detergent, so he tried using dish soap instead. The result was a flood of soapy bubbles spilling from the washing machine.

_“Worthless! Ruined! How could you be so stupid???”_

His shoes had become too tight but he was too afraid to ask for a new pair so he cut a slit in the back so at least his spur- which he realized was growing longer, stronger, and sharper- wouldn’t cut into the rest of his foot.

_"What are you, stupid???"_

The question rang out, harsh and sharp, shattering the air, shattering the walls, sending a rain of broken bits of crystal, all down on him.

The question echoed through his skull, sending tremors up and down his body, aching like the bruises blossoming under his feathers.

Every inch of him trembled. His hands were balled into tights fists, squeezing so hard as if what he was feeling was physically manifest in the palms of his hands. As if, if he squeezed tightly enough, he could squish it out of existence, crush it, kill it.

“I’m not,” he risked a hoarse whisper, voice thick and raw, edged with everything he was trying so desperately to contain within himself.

“I’m not,” he whispered again. He felt a large hot tear slide across his beak.

He memorized the pattern of the floral wallpaper. It would permanently be tattooed to his mind..

He used to not mind school. He liked it because it wasn’t home. But then the teachers started making them read aloud. He couldn’t unhear the snickers and giggles sneaking in the corners of the classroom as he stared at a block of text that became a wall of words torn by slippery rivers of white space. No matter how hard he tried to zone in on a single word, break it into parts like the teacher said, the letters seemed to shift before his eyes, to jump from one space to another.

After that he stopped raising his hand during class. Stopped sharing his ideas and strategies on how the revolutionary soldiers _should_ have fought the Birdish in 1776, or how _he_ would have defeated the villain of the stories. His teachers always deemed his ideas as “very creative” or “how imaginative” through a tight, wavering smile. That was probably just code for stupid. Everyone thought he was stupid now.

He wasn’t sick this particular day he decided to stay home from school. But Rhodie Barkley hadn’t gone to school the day before. Which meant Rhodie Barkley wasn’t there to bully into doing his homework for him after school. Which meant he had no complete homework assignments to turn in this morning.

Rhodie Barkley always got gold stars on his homework assignments, Rhodie Barkley was adored by the teachers. Rhodie Barkley always brought a brand new soccer ball, to share with the other kids at recess, or a new video game, or a comic book or whatever new treasure his parents had bought him. Rhodie Barkley always got a new backpack every school year, never came to school with his books in a grocery bag or with shoes with holes in the bottom. He wasn’t a particularly big kid but Rhodie Barkely was a particularly small kid.

But yesterday Rhodie had been absent from school. So there was no point in going today.

He was thinking about stupid smart Rhodie Barkely and his stupid smart glasses and his stupid fresh, brand new backpack when he kicked the rock. A second later he heard the crash. The large jagged edges of glass lay there in the grass, glinting in the sunlight. The gaping hole in the window stared at him.

He knew he would be punished for it. Even if he hid all the broken pieces, even if he boarded up the window with cardboard , or better yet plastic wrap, it was only a matter of time- a handful of hours- before his mistake was discovered, and he’d be punished. So, instead, he ran away and never looked back.

He would find someplace better, travel the world, get rich on treasure hunting. If Scrooge McDuck could do it why not him? He just had to keep running and he’d find his palace eventually.

Instead, he found himself in the slums of St. Canard.

He wasn’t the only kid on the streets but he might have been the youngest. They weren’t a gang. Not exactly. There was no misunderstanding of loyalty or trust between the rag tag group of hoodlums. They just knew it was easier to survive in a community. Easier to pick a pocket if someone was the distraction. Easier to scavenge if the scouts could split off and report which neighborhood had the best haul for that day. Easier to evade the cops if someone was playing lookout.

It was there on the streets when he first learned how to throw a punch. Being the smallest in the group made him an easy target. But because he had spent so much time learning to prepare for them, he was good at predicting when and where the punches would be thrown. And that made him good at dodging them. He noticed when his opponent shifted their weight, when they pulled their shoulder back, took into consideration the length of their arms.

The first time he hit someone, it was another street kid, three years older and probably a good head taller than him.

He used to hide in the space between the couch and the wall, with nothing in view except for the floral wallpaper. He used to curl into a ball, staring at the flowers in the wallpaper, squeezing his fists tight, trying to hold everything in. And now, with his fists curled the same way, he let everything out.

It felt good. Really good.

Pretty soon, he became known for never shying away from a fight. Even if it was 5 to 1. Pretty soon, he became known for picking fights, even if it was 5 to 1, with the odds against him. And pretty soon, he got good at throwing punches, really good.

Brutal. Ruthless. That’s what they called him. When he eventually found his way to the fighting ring, like so many in the street gang wound up, he learned to be quick, learned to use every tool in his arsenal, including his beak and spurs. The spin kicks didn’t come naturally. For someone of his size, they took hours of training before he could perform them with the dangerous efficiency needed. But that made them all the more of a surprise advantage when he did use them in the ring.

Using his beak though, that was second nature, came as easy as breathing. It became his signature move. Left hook, right hook, and finish it off with a peck straight to the skull. The goal wasn’t to actually do damage to the skull, bone was stronger than beak after all, just to hit the other guy with enough force that the brain rammed against the skull and the opponent dropped like a fly. It was his finishing move. Instant knockout, every time.

It’s how he won the title rank. It took years of training by day and competing by night but eventually he became the reigning champ. But his signature move was also how he lost his beak.

He took the title from a badger. She was a heavy hitter but a lousy dodger. He tired the badger out with evasive movements, leaned out of reach, and struck mostly with kicks. Until he finally got her against the ropes. Then it was lights out.

A year later, the badger came back to reclaim the title. He should have known something was wrong from the start.

The badger wasn’t striking with the same ferocity, wasn’t doging like she was trying to reclaim her title. When he finally got her where he wanted her-left hook, right hook-and was rearing back in preparation for the final blow she _smiled_ at him. He didn’t think anything of it though, he went in to deliver the finishing blow. But at the last moment, she reared up and lunged herself towards him, meeting his beak with the front of her skull.

 _CRACK_.

Pain laced through his entire body. He stumbled backward, hand reaching up to protect his beak but the slightest touch sent waves of white hot pain flaring across his nerves.

He would later overhear the cops say that since their last fight, the badger had a titanium plate surgically implanted in her skull.

He had felt the beak split when they made contact. He knew it had to be fractured. He had to regain his footing, had to get through the blinding pain, he was able to focus his vision just in time to see the badger advancing on him, something metallic around her knuckles caught the light.

He swung at the badger, but his footing was no good. Still backpedaling from the hit, his beak still splitting with the worst pain he ever felt, he didn’t stand a chance. The badger easily blocked his swing before advancing, shoving her full weight on top of him. The badger had him pinned to the floor, an illegal move, even in the underground ring, but no one was rushing in to stop it. The badger was delivering blow after blow. Blood spewed from his beak as the brass knuckles came in contact with his already fractured beak, he felt it split further, felt it cave under the force of the badger’s fist.

His vision swam as he teetered on the edge of consciousness. He probably would have died that day, if the cops hadn’t chosen that day of all days to bust the place. They hauled him away, kicking, screaming, injured, and bleeding... but alive.

Prison, the more he thought about it, wasn’t all that different from the underground ring. Sure his freedoms were limited to one hour of outside rec time, but other than that, the concrete walls, the absence of natural lighting practically made it homey. He even had plenty of his former competitors- those who hadn’t been lucky or quick enough to fly the coop once the feds busted the place- under the same roof with him.

He stared at the gray concrete ceiling through the darkness of his cell, trying to figure out which of his former fighting rivals had set him up. Someone had to have paid off the bouncers so they didn’t intervene when the badger pinned him against the floor, an illegal move, or smuggled in the brass knuckles, another illegal item.

Maybe the badger worked alone, to get revenge for her loss of the title, or maybe any one of his prison bunkies was waiting for the right moment to send a shiv in his belly.

“Hey you’re not allowed to be in h-” a guard’s voice was cut off by what sounded like the low buzz and crackle of raw, unfiltered electricity. The sound was followed by the satisfying thud of a body hitting the floor.

“Sorry man, we’re just going to have a quick look around,” came a woman’s voice, one he didn’t recognize as belonging to any of the guards. “What exactly are we looking for Heron?”

A second voice, an older, annoyed voice responded, “The buzzards seem to think, despite my reasoning to the contrary, that F.O.W.L needs more muscle lurking around the base. If you ask me, there’s already too many pea-brained goons in proximity of my lab and research.”

“Ugh. Tell me about it,” the first voice cut in “one of those egg heads barged into my lab thinking it was the bathroom. Walked right in on my light-sensitive nano tech experiment. Cost me an entire morning’s worth of work.”

“Why they sent us to this cest-pool of imbeciles to collect I’ll never understand!” The second voice responded. “Just find a couple of meatheads willing to work on F.O.W.L.'s dollar. Shouldn’t be too hard. This place stinks of desperation.”

The clack of footsteps echoed off the concrete floor, a figure appeared outside his cell door. Beyond the bars, he could make out the silhouette of a woman with short choppy hair wearing ripped and baggy jeans. He glowered at her, even pulling back his mangled maw, what was left of it, into a fearsome snarl, he imagined that without the bandages to hide his mutilated horror, he must look pretty monstrous.

But this girl had nerves of steel. Didn’t even flinch. Instead she smirked.

“Hey Heron, I think I found your next pet project.”

“What on earth are you talking about,” came the second voice more annoyed than before.

“Just get over here and look. You can thank me later.”

The first figure stepped away only to be replaced with a second, older woman, dressed in a red dress and flashy white boots at least three decades out of style. But what captured his attention was the shiny robotic arm hanging at her side.

He shot her the same scowl he gave the first woman, if not with a few added degrees of malice. But this woman in red met his glare with a sharp and devilish grin that would have turned a lesser man’s nerves to jelly.

“Well, well, well,” her words rolled polished and sharp, “what do we have here?”

The choice she gave him wasn’t much of a choice. Join them in their plot to steal the world or be left behind in the hole.

He was a lousy poker player. He knew because sometimes when there was a delay in fights because of a sting operation the underground circuit barely caught wind of in time, fighters would pass the time by playing cards in the backroom of their secondary location.He often took too high a risk for too little reward. Sometimes he had trouble remembering which hands were the good ones.

“You don’t know when to fold kid,” a one-eyed boar had told him as he raked in a pile of chips after his pair of sevens and jack high hadn’t delivered the victory he was banking on.

Maybe the boar had been right. He had learned a long time ago to never let your opponent know when they had an advantage over you. Even if you were clueless to the situation, never admit your ignorance. Any advantage of your opponent was a weakness of yours and weakness got you killed. Play along, bluff your way to the bitter end and maybe, just maybe, you’d make it out alive.

So when this cyborg lady stood outside his cell, extending an invitation to ditch the hole for something else, he weighed the situation. As far as he could tell, she had every advantage over him. She was the one on the other side of the bars, she was the one with the robot arm. He on the other hand, was left with a gruesome, gaping, grimace in place of what used to be his livelihood. He was in no position to be bargaining.

And yet, he recognized he had one, and only one advantage. For some reason, this cyborg lady _wanted_ him. She took one look at him, and smiled with that wicked grin. She wanted him as her “pet project” whatever that meant. So, he decided to leverage the only advantage he had. Play hardball. Make her up her ante.

He wasn’t entirely sure how he did it to be honest. He didn’t follow half the things the lady in red told him but he did understand that they were looking for some guys to play the role of muscle. He could do that sure, better than any other guy in the hole. Any one of his prison mates could play the part of a low-level stooge, but he knew he was worth more than that. So, he took the gamble. He wanted better and he was willing to bet, the punk rock and disco duo had it up their sleeve.

She threatened to leave him to rot. But he didn’t fold. It looked like she was about to storm off without so much as a glance behind, but her eyes lingered on the stump that used to be his money maker. She frowned, glared, conflict crossed her features before she finally snapped “Fine!”

Next thing he knew he was trading in his orange jumpsuit for personally tailored suits, wrist shackles for mother-of-pearl cufflinks, and a broken and bloody stub-his trophy for a lifetime of violence- for something fierce and gleaming.

They never asked for his name and he didn’t mind. Standing in front of the mirror, admiring the foreign metal object welded to the center of his face, he decided ‘Steelbeak’ was as good a name as any he previously had.

He had a name back in the house with the flowery wallpaper, but that was seldom used, not as often as ‘Stupid’ anyway. But those memories weren’t visited anymore. They were tucked away, wrapped in cellophane and hidden in the recess of his mind.

He had been a nobody. A nameless, unidentified street urchin nobody was looking for, and then a nameless, rookie in the ring. He was either “hey kid” or “hey you”. In the ring he was either the winner or the loser. When he started winning consistently he was “the returning champ.” When he started getting more attention and more bets, he was brutal, ruthless; Not a name, a description. In prison he was given a number, but more often than not the guards referred to him as “the guy with the busted face”

His entire life, summed up in one crummy phrase. He had punched and clawed his way to the title, to the top. Fighting guys as desperate as he was. But in an underground fighting ring, the summit only reaches so high and the view at the top isn’t nearly as sweet as you hoped.

It almost wasn’t a loss when the cops broke it all up. At least from behind bars, the air was cleaner. But what was his victory? Caged off from the rest of the world with only the memory of being the best of the lowest, the champion of the gutters to keep him afloat?

But the lady in red, Black Heron, had told him he was going to help them steal the world from those who didn’t deserve it.

The world. It sounded like a good start.

The name Steelbeak could mean something, could strike fear into the hearts of anyone who heard it. As an agent of F.O.W.L. he could be somebody.

But he wasn’t stupid.

He had been around long enough to know how groups like this one worked. You were either useful, or you were dead.

He had thought that Black Heron was his partner. But she had made it clear to him that wasn’t the case and he was not about to make that mistake again.

Just like the gang of street kids, just like the underground ring, just like prison. No misunderstandings of friendship or loyalty. You don’t trust anyone farther than you can throw them. If you form an alliance, it’s because each has something they can gain from the other. Lower your guard and get a knife in the back, maybe literally.

So no, he wasn’t about to let his guard down.

And then he met Fethry Duck.

  
After the intelli-ray incident, Steelbeak and Heron were suspended from field duty. Heron sulked and withdrew to her private lab. Steelbeak was left to wander the halls aimlessly before the glorified babysitting duty was his newest form of punishment. His job was simple. Keep the asset clueless and make sure he didn’t stick his beak anywhere it didn’t belong. It was a mission so simple, that, according to Director Buzzard, not even Steelbeak could screw it up.

He hadn’t known what to expect from this obscure McDuck nephew. He knew from all the F.O.W.L. briefings he had been forced to sit through that all members of the McDuck family were threats, dangerous in their own way, even the little ones.

And then there was Fethry.

Fethry Duck, dismissed as a non-threat and an idiot by Director Buzzard. Stupid enough to hand himself over as an oblivious hostage. Fethry Duck, the subject of Heron’s under-the-breath mutterings, something about “playing into the stereotype” and “you sure that guy is only half loon?” Fethry Duck, who bought the cock-and-bull story of lab security being present to protect pending patents and unlicensed intellectual property or whatever the buzzard had come up with.

Fethry Duck, who hummed while he worked. Fethry Duck, who bobbed his head while he hummed. Fethry, who named each specimen he brought into the lab and spoke to them in a kind, reassuring way.

Steelbeak had tried to come off as menacing at first.

He was less than pleased to be forced to sit in a lab all day when Agent G or ghost guy were out doing who knows what, causing whatever havoc to the McDuck family. Meanwhile, he was being benched, reassigned to idle work that any egghead could have done in their sleep.

He retreated to the corner of the lab, arms crossed, glaring as the little guy from his metal stool as he rambled on about whatever he was working on. Steelbeak had tried the occasional interjection, cutting in with quips, borderline insults, or vaguely aggressive remarks. But they seemed to go right over the asset’s head. His persistent sunniness kept him buoyant, like an unsinkable battleship.

That was...a first. Steelbeak knew was an intimidating guy. His intimidation tactics were usually either met with cowering or matched aggression that usually ended in a brawl. Even when Steelbeak tried kicking it up a notch, casually dropping the fact that he had once dislocated the jaw of a grizzly with a single uppercut, or that he had been in prison prior to his current employment, the McDuck nephew responded with his characteristic smile and babbled on about something to do with the formation of pearls.

After weeks of being unable to get a rise out of the hostage, Steelbeak retreated to silence from his corner across the lab. But boredom overtook him in a matter of days and he eventually ventured over to the lab table where a shallow touch tank had been set up to cover most of the table.

“So what’s this mess?”

“Oh Mr. Steelbeak!” The duck beamed up at him, surprised but welcoming of his sudden interest. “I was just cataloging my newest specimen, say hello to Mr. Steelbeak, Angeline!

In his hands, the asset held a...well he wasn’t sure what… a weird, spikey looking ball. Steelbeak wouldn’t have guessed it was alive but the needle-like spikes shifted slightly, as if waving hello.

Fethry cupped the creature gently in his hands.

“You did fantastic Angeline! Thank you for your help, you can go back to your friends now,” and with that, he lowered his hands below the surface of the water, parted his palms, and allowed the small thing to slowly sink back down to the bottom of the touch tank.

He was always like that, Steelbeak had noticed. He always spoke to his lab specimens encouragingly with a gentle voice and moved with an even gentler touch.

Black Heron didn’t use live specimens very often in her lab. But even when she did, he couldn’t remember her ever speaking to them, never moving them with any consideration beyond getting them from point A to point B. Where Heron was all sharp angles and pointed glares, Fethry was all rounded edges and soft smiles.

Fethry gestured to the table behind him where more of the spiky balls sat unmoving in the touch tank.

“Magenta, Henry, Spike, Yolanda, Franklin, Gilbert the Gallavant, Rocky, and Rostia are deep sea urchins from the the Atlantic trench,” he said as he pointed out each one. “I’m trying to understand the effects of a mutanant agent on deep sea creatures.”

Steelbeak was a good deal taller than Fethry, so the duck had to look up to meet his eyes as he spoke. But that did nothing to hinder the enthusiasm of his voice.

“You see, these guys live on the ocean floor by hydrothermal vents. Those are cracks in the sea floor where superheated fluids and toxic minerals escape through. It’s a harsh environment but species like Angeline and her friends still find a way to live there. I think that the hydrothermal vents mutated them, that’s why they’re a different color and their spines are shaped differently from their cousins.”

He said this while gesturing to a cluster of bright red urchins Steelbeak hadn’t noticed earlier.

“They’re all part of the same family, but they’re different from each other. I’m trying to understand how and why the vents made them different.”

“So you’re trying to figure out what’s wrong with them?”

For the first time, Fethry’s smile slipped.

“Well, nothing’s wrong with them. They just changed,” he said softly. “Sometimes living things have to change to survive their environment. It’s called adaptation. Sea urchins can live almost anywhere, in tidepools where they’re close to the sunshine, in coral reefs where they have lots and lots of fish neighbors, or even in the deep, deep, total, absolute, very, very, bottom zone.”

“Adaptation?” Steelbeak repeated, “Is that good or bad?”

“Well…” Fethry rubbed the back of his neck as he picked his next words, “Just because something is different doesn’t mean its bad. And just because something changes from what it used to be doesn’t make it bad, but it doesn’t always make it good either. If Angeline and her friends wanted to move back to the tidepools, they might have a hard time adjusting. Does that make sense?”

Steelbeak shrugged.

“So what about this thing over here?” Steelbeak said, leaning in to stare at the slippery looking creature in a separate tank.

“That’s Noodle!” Fethry’s voice chimed from behind Steelbeak. “Usually electric eels live in shallow and murky waters, but Noodle here is a real marvel! You should see him when he sparks up! His natural bioluminescence lights up as he generates his electricity.”

Steelbeak frowned. Fethry had to be pulling his leg. But the genuine awe in his voice made Steelbeak hesitate.

“An electric eel? Even I know that water and electricity don’t mix. How could a fish make electricity without frying itself?"

“That’s a great question!” Fethry exclaimed, guileless enthusiasm rising to the surface again. Steelbeak waited for the snarl of laughter, waited for the duck’s features to twist into annoyance followed by a harsh bark of laughter at Steelbeak’s expense. But it never came.

“Scientists have been asking that same for years! The truth is that we don’t know. Electric eels can produce electricity to help them detect what’s in the water around them and even stun their prey. But for some reason, they’re not affected. Scientists don’t know if it’s a special coat of proteins on the eel’s skin or if they’re just resistant to their own shocks. ”

Steelbeak made the mistake of looking down at Fethry. He was surprised to see the duck was gazing back at him, with a soft, light smile brightening his features.

Steelbeak was caught off guard by a sudden...something. Some kind of movement, some kind of twist in his chest like a wet cloth being wrung out to dry.

“Yeah, w-well, I got electrocuted once. No big deal. Maybe all the other fish are just a bunch of wimps, ” he said crossing his arms.

“Were you okay?”

The duck peered up at him with wide, round, eyes, brimming with a gentle, genuine concern Steelbeak could not remember ever receiving.

And he felt it again, a sharp... _pain_?? Bigger this time, spreading like a jagged tear ripping at his ribcage.

He averted his eyes.

“Uh, yeah, yeah. It was no big deal. You should have seen the other guy.”

‘The other guy’ being a tiny plane flown by a group of dumb rats turned smart. But Steelbeak chose to omit that detail.

“Was it your beak? Is that how the other guy hurt you?”

“What? Why would you-” Steelbeak only then realized that at some point he had lifted his hand and began lightly rubbing his beak.

He tore his hand away. “This trap!” he snapped, a pointed finger gesturing towards his face “is the best on the block! I use it to hurt people who get on my nerves, not the other way around!”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to-”

But Steelbeak didn’t wait for Fethry to finish. Not wanting to deck the asset in a fit of sudden anger, Steelbeak stormed away, back to his usual corner. He slumped into his stool and let the asset continue to work in silence. At least that was his intention. But for the next few hours the asset kept glancing up in his direction while Steelbeak pretended to be staring across the room towards the door.

Steelbeak was content to ignore it, but as the hours passed and the day drew near its end, the McDuck sighed and looked up at Steelbeak.

“Mr. Steelbeak, I really am sorry. I always did have a bad habit of sticking my foot in my mouth.”

He rubbed the back of his neck as he spoke, eyes jumped from Steelbeak to the floor.

“And uh, well that just makes it all the more likely to start off on the wrong foot with someone.”

Steelbeak kept his arms crossed and his eyes forward.

“But uh- I don’t want to do that with you. I really do like having you around the lab and...I would never want to do something to upset you.

“Don’t worry about it.”

“But I do! And-and I’m going to!” The duck said with more force than Steelbeak was expecting.

He turned his head, channeling a glare like the kind he was used to receiving. The asset didn’t waiver, despite the perturbed look displayed across his face.

“What’s your deal?”

Umm...sorry, how do you mean?

Steelbeak leaned forward in his seat and locked eyes with the strange McDuck nephew.

“I mean, I tell you I get into fights, bad ones, the kind where you get electrocuted and maybe almost die. I tell you I spend time in prison, you know, where they throw away low-down criminals? I tell you that _my face_ can be used to hurt people, and...and…”

For a moment, Steelbeak’s beak gaped for words, “and you don’t even flinch! You treat it like I just told you I pick daisies on weekends.”

To his credit, Fethry Duck didn’t seem to whither under his gaze as Steelbeak was half expecting him to do. Maybe this McDuck nephew was made of tougher stuff than he had been led to believe.

“Well, I-umm…” Fethry’s beak opened and closed as he searched for words. Open and honest in his nervousness as he was in all things. He lifted one arm to rub the sleeve of his oversized sweater.

Slowly, thoughtfully, he said, “I learned a long time ago, from someone important to me, that...that people are complicated...and its not fair to judge them before you know them.”

He chewed his lower beak before continuing. “My, um, my brother spent some time behind bars too...but well, no one is all good or all bad.”

“You have a brother?”

Steelbeak raked his mind trying to recall every member of the McDuck family tree they had been briefed on at those endless FOWL meetings. There was sailor nephew, lucky green nephew, lady nephew, the four mini-nephews.

Fethry nodded absently.

“My brother, Abner, he’s...he’s not a bad person. Everyone always said he was trouble, always glowering, kinda had a gruff way of talking to people but..”

Fethry’s voice had become softer, “He did some bad things but…”

He sighed and lifted his eyes back towards Steelbeak. As disarming as it was, Steelbeak forced himself not to look away.

“It doesn’t bother me that you were in prison, Steelbeak. I know that detail isn’t enough to make a fair assumption about someone.”

He looked up at him with such a clarity, eyes wide and clear like polished glass.

Steelbeak felt something catch in his chest. He fished his brain for something to say, but it felt like someone had taken a fork to his thoughts and whisked them like scrambled eggs. Fethry beat him to his next words anyhow.

“We’re going to be around each other a lot, and if it's alright with you, well, I hope we could start over, on the right foot.”

He was unguarded, Steelbeak realized. Not just in this moment, but all the time. That’s how he would describe him. Unguarded enthusiasm when he worked, unguarded sincerity when he spoke, unguarded softness in his smile and warmth in his eyes.

And for some reason, he didn’t want to shut that down.

“Yeah, sure,” he rasped, far lower than he had intended.

And Fethry smiled. That bright, beaming, smile that seemed to light up the rest of the underground lab.

It took an unfairly short time for Steelbeak to realize he enjoyed the company of Fethry Duck.

Weirdo, oddball, Fethry Duck.

Fethry Duck who sang to a jar of shrimp-no krill. Steelbeak remembered, Fethry had told them they were krill.

Fethry Duck, who always smiled when Steelbeak entered the lab. Fethry Duck, who always nodded and listened, really listened, whenever Steelbeak was talking, who never glared like he was waiting for Steelbeak to finish speaking, and who never, not even once, called any of his questions stupid.

Fethry even interjected with “great question!” or “I like the way you’re thinking!”

Talking to Fethry was easy, in a way Steelbeak had never experienced with anyone before. He never felt like he was in over his head when Fethry explained sciency stuff. He always did it in a way Steelbeak could follow with ease. Steelbeak never felt the need to bluff his way through the conversation, it always felt like they were on the same page and could build off the other’s train of thought.

What’s more he liked talking to Fethry. It wasn’t strategic, there was no underlying motive to try to get information out of one another.

Well other than the whole secretly-holidng-you-as-hostage-to-get-the-upper-hand-on-your-uncle thing. But Steelbeak tried to think about that as little as he could.

He liked listening to him ramble on about the social behaviors of arctic krill, he liked watching the way he would bob his head and flail his hands when he got really excited while describing strange-looking barnacle formations he’d come across.

He looked forward to seeing him in the lab every morning and at the end of the day, he replayed the conversations in his head long after they had ended. He could remember every detail of Fethry’s expression while he gave a rambling lecture on carcinisation and the way he tilted his head and softened his smile when Steelbeak spoke.

And that scared him, more than anything.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YEE-IKES. Really heavy handed narration in this chapter. I'll plan to have less of that and more action/dialogue in the next chapter. And more Fethry/SB interactions!


End file.
